As I said in my Die Antwoord post some time ago, much of the inhabited southern hemisphere is pretty fucked up once you step away from the designated resort areas. Port Chalmers is no different to the rest of post-industrial New Zealand. We've slid down a slow arc spanning regionalist colonial enthusiasm to the end of meaningful investment in employment and social development as instituted by New Right policy in the early nineties. As a direct result of that purely unselfish philosophical largesse, the last time I glanced at census statistics we were smack in the midst of the poorest electorate in the country.
That data might have been gathered before the demographic change that imported a bunch of post-grad yummy mummies and on-road offroaders, but we're still ghetto, baby. The Lovely R and I don't mind that Port is po and more than a wee bit rough around the edges; so are we. We thought we'd present some of choicer fragments of tangible degradation and urban abstracts in the form of a photoessay entitled Surface Failure.
This is part one; hope you enjoy it.
That data might have been gathered before the demographic change that imported a bunch of post-grad yummy mummies and on-road offroaders, but we're still ghetto, baby. The Lovely R and I don't mind that Port is po and more than a wee bit rough around the edges; so are we. We thought we'd present some of choicer fragments of tangible degradation and urban abstracts in the form of a photoessay entitled Surface Failure.
This is part one; hope you enjoy it.
| ABOVE road markings and encroaching lichen. We get a lot of awesome lichens, apparently because of our excellent air quality; I sort of doubt this. Did you know that approximately six percent of the earth's surface is thusly encrusted? I did not.  ABOVE sign on one of the colonial bank buildings lining George st, our main drag. It did used to say something but I forget what it was. RIGHT chair, Island Terrace. Port is home to a cavalcade of shitty old sheds banged anciently together from iron and asbestos boards, each more munted than the last. Some visibly yearn for oblivion. Others just need a bath. |  |
 BELOW window frame, Grey st,  | LEFT who doesn't love a good hinge? Every fastening known to man has been torn from their original farming and maritime contexts and pressed into alternative duty, holding up structures no one bothers with and securing contents nobody cares about. Such is life. BELOW moss, autumn debris and mystery foam on Island Terrace. I'm always intrigued by gutter foam, especially in isolation. Knowing Port's occult reticulation and drainage plan as intimately as we do, I'm not sure why I still regard monster ponding and surfactant events as enigmatic, but there'll always be a little bit of ? attached to sights like this.  |
BELOW more chemicular mystery. Port Chalmers is a noted feral outpost and from this welter of unconsidered couplings arises a cohort of randomised juveniles. The Lovely R reminds me that every human mote consigned to this unsightly localised superabundance results in increased job security for his good self, but still. I tend not to like people shorter than me. They shriek, tag shit and sometimes empty paint (?) tins onto the footpath, the little gobshites.
BELOW LEFT splendid green tin. BELOW RIGHT random pit sawn timber.
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 | LEFT bluestone retaining wall, Wickliffe terrace. Bluestone is a classy-sounding name for volcanic breccia, which is a bit of a geological scrubber in that it's just a bunch of other rocks smooshed together by circumstance. Our circumstance was a miocene shield volcano. This is local stone and I wish these pre-war installations were accorded a little more respect. There are quite a few still extant, but in definite need of attention. |
BELOW two aspects of a hypnotically blue shed on Island Terrace. This turquoise emulsion is peeling from the timber, failing slowly like an affection both determined and unrequited. I see this striking colour dotted here and there around the town and always in this historic state, so it must have been on half price special for a short time circa 1954. We will feature it again because it is undeniably awesome and the Lovely R has recorded some particularly hot details.
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